'Divine Intervention' Saves Drowned Toddler

A hospital nurse preparing a drowned two-year-old to be collected by an undertaker noticed the boy was breathing - more than an hour after he had been pronounced dead.

Logan Pinto had wandered away from his baby sitter and fell into a canal near his home in Rexburg, Idaho.

He was submerged for nearly 30 minutes before police found him about half a mile downstream, said police Captain Randy Lewis.

Though an officer tried to resuscitate him and emergency workers did everything they could to revive him, the boy was pronounced dead when it appeared the effort had failed.

After giving the boy's mother and stepfather - Debra and Joe Gould - some time to say goodbye, Madison Memorial Hospital nurse Mary Zollinger began to prepare Logan's body for the funeral home.

But when she looked at the boy, she noticed his chest was slightly moving and realised that Logan was alive.

The boy was flown to Primary Children's Medical Centre in Salt Lake City, where he was listed in critical condition today.

Late Thursday, he was breathing on his own and his colour had returned, but he was placed back on a respirator today, Lewis said.

"I'm just amazed and overwhelmed with what took place," Lewis said. "They aggressively worked on him for quite a bit of time, and of course it's a bad situation when you have to let the parents know that their son has passed away."

But despair turned to joy when emergency workers learned the boy was alive.

"It's called divine intervention, I think. I was dumbfounded. I couldn't believe it hardly, especially after leaving there and seeing what had transpired," Lewis said. "I don't know how to explain it. It's joyous and relieving."